Model Management Systems vs. Model Driven Engineering: a case study

Research in the field of Model-Driven Development follows two main approaches: Model Management Systems and Model-Driven Engineering. The former comes from the field of Databases whereas the latter has its roots in the Software Engineering community. This paper presents a practical comparison of the two approaches in order to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each one. More specifically, we have compared MIDST and ATL, as representative technological solutions for a Model Management System and Model-Driven Engineering respectively. This has been achieved by carrying out a case study based on the transformation of Entity-Relationship schemas into Object-Relational schemas. The conclusion reached is that, although the use of MIDST is, in general, more complex, in data model domains the benefits of its use compensate for its complexity. However, in other domains, such as those which are Service-Oriented, ATL may be more intuitive.